FEMA in a hurry to get rid of trailers

Published Friday, February 15, 2008

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- After downplaying the risks for months, the Federal Emergency Management Agency said Thursday it will rush to move Gulf Coast hurricane victims out of roughly 35,000 government-issued trailers because tests found dangerous levels of formaldehyde fumes.

FEMA Administrator R. David Paulison said the agency hopes to get everyone out and into hotels, motels, apartments and other temporary housing by the summer, when the heat and stuffy air could worsen the problem inside the trailers.

Louisiana has 25,162 occupied FEMA trailers and mobile homes, while Mississippi has 10,362, according to FEMA.

Other states also have hundreds of trailers. At one point, FEMA had placed victims of the 2005 hurricanes in more than 144,000 trailers and mobile homes.

Paulison had no estimate of how much it would cost to put people in hotels, apartments and other housing.

Formaldehyde has been classified as a carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer and a probable carcinogen by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Fumes can cause burning of the eyes and nose, shortness of breath, wheezing, coughing and tightness in the chest.

The CDC examined only FEMA housing and cannot draw any conclusions about the safety of prefab homes elsewhere, Gerberding said. But "I think we're going to learn a lot more in the next year or two," she said after a news conference at FEMA offices in New Orleans.

"It seems like I have had more respiratory problems since I have been in the trailer," Roger Sheldon, 60, said in Pascagoula, Miss. But he was not ready to blame formaldehyde "You know you can walk into any new trailer, or house for that matter, and things like new carpet can cause irritation."

"To be honest, I'm thankful to the government," he added. "I don't like the trailer, but it beats the alternative for now."

With housing still in short supply 80 percent of New Orleans was flooded, the pace of rebuilding has been slow, and rents are out of reach for many Ernest Penns of the devastated Lower Ninth Ward said he, too, was grateful for his trailer: "I got nowhere else to go."